1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to the field of information handling systems and more particularly to providing automated services procurement via a multi-stage process.
2. Description of the Related Art
As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
With the proliferation of information handling systems, especially within large scale information handling system installations, an important issue relates to the service and support of the large scale information handling system installations (i.e., installations in which more than a few information handling systems are supported by a single entity). The entity that services and supports such an installation is often referred to as a managed service provider. Managed services, or life-cycle services, generally include deployment services and asset services. More specifically, managed services include some or all of asset deployment and installation services, asset management services (including, e.g., both asset tracking and asset moving services), asset maintenance services and asset retirement services.
A managed service provider provides a customer with an ability to procure, deploy, support and manage information handling system technologies across the life cycle of the information handling systems. Issues relating to managed services include information management and asset utilization while providing quality service delivery and a favorable customer experience.
One issue relating to a managed services environment relates to the use of agents on information handling systems within the managed services environment. With information handling systems within a managed services environment which include agents, if an information handling system is unable to boot or loses its agent installation, often the only way for the information handling system to reinstall the agent is to boot the operating system, return to a services internet portal, download the agent and reinstall the agent on the system.
With the present system, it is not only possible to boot to a remote location but a multi-stage process can be used to install multiple agents based on the services that a customer has purchased and is entitled. This approach can be used whether the system is able or unable to boot the operating system. Furthermore, the boot process can be directed on a stage by stage basis through a dynamic URL re-direction. This gives a services provider the opportunity to enable dynamic and customized services within a company. For instance, an Online Backup and Recovery service could be offered on a company basis. However, in certain instances, say for the accounting department, those services could also include the ability to clone the backup so that it can be reinstalled on a number of system configurations in the event that the main machine is lost due to hardware failure.